Preview — Family Happiness
by Leo Tolstoy

Family Happiness

Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (1828-1910) commonly referred to in English as Leo Tolstoy, was a Russian writer - novelist, essayist, dramatist and philosopher - as well as pacifist Christian anarchist and educational reformer. He was the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy family. His first publications were three autobiographical novels, Childhood, BoyhooCount Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (1828-1910) commonly referred to in English as Leo Tolstoy, was a Russian writer - novelist, essayist, dramatist and philosopher - as well as pacifist Christian anarchist and educational reformer. He was the most influential member of the aristocratic Tolstoy family. His first publications were three autobiographical novels, Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth (1852-1856). They tell of a rich landowner's son and his slow realization of the differences between him and his peasants. As a fiction writer Tolstoy is widely regarded as one of the greatest of all novelists, particularly noted for his masterpieces War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877). In their scope, breadth and realistic depiction of 19th-century Russian life, the two books stand at the peak of realist fiction. As a moral philosopher Tolstoy was notable for his ideas on nonviolent resistance through works such as The Kingdom of God is Within You (1894)....more

Семейное счастье [Semeynoye Schast'ye] = Family Happiness, Leo Tolstoy Family Happiness is an 1859 novella written by Leo Tolstoy, first published in The Russian Messenger. The story concerns the love and marriage of a young girl, Mashechka (17 years old), and the much older Sergey Mikhaylych (36), an old family friend. The story is narrated by Masha. After a courtship that has the trappings of a mere family friendship, Masha's love grows and expands until she can no longer contain it. She reveaСемейное счастье [Semeynoye Schast'ye] = Family Happiness, Leo Tolstoy Family Happiness is an 1859 novella written by Leo Tolstoy, first published in The Russian Messenger. The story concerns the love and marriage of a young girl, Mashechka (17 years old), and the much older Sergey Mikhaylych (36), an old family friend. The story is narrated by Masha. After a courtship that has the trappings of a mere family friendship, Masha's love grows and expands until she can no longer contain it. She reveals it to Sergey Mikhaylych and discovers that he also is deeply in love. If he has resisted her it was because of his fear that the age difference between them would lead the very young Masha to tire of him. He likes to be still and quiet, he tells her, while she will want to explore and discover more and more about life. Ecstatically and passionately happy, the pair immediately engages to be married. Once married they move to Mikhaylych's home. They are both members of the landed Russian upper class. Masha soon feels impatient with the quiet order of life on the estate, notwithstanding the powerful understanding and love that remains between the two. To assuage her anxiety, they decide to spend a few weeks in St. Petersburg. Sergey Mikhaylych agrees to take Masha to an aristocratic ball. He hates "society" but she is enchanted with it. They go again, and then again. She becomes a regular, the darling of the countesses and princes, with her rural charm and her beauty. Sergey Mikhaylych, at first very pleased with Petersburg society's enthusiasm for his wife, frowns on her passion for "society"; but he does not try to influence Masha. Out of respect for her, Sergey Mikhaylych will scrupulously allow his young wife to discover the truth about the emptiness and ugliness of "society" on her own. But his trust in her is damaged as he watches how dazzled she is by this world. Finally they confront each other about their differences. They argue but do not treat their conflict as something that can be resolved through negotiation. Both are shocked and mortified that their intense love has suddenly been called into question. Something has changed. Because of pride, they both refuse to talk about it. The trust and the closeness are gone. Only courteous friendship remains. Masha yearns to return to the passionate closeness they had known before Petersburg. They go back to the country. Though she gives birth to children and the couple has a good life, she despairs. They can barely be together by themselves. Finally she asks him to explain why he did not try to guide and direct her away from the balls and the parties in Petersburg. Why did they lose their intense love? Why don't they try to bring it back? His answer is not the answer she wants to hear, but it settles her down and prepares her for a long life of comfortable "Family Happiness".تاریخ نخستین خوانش: بیست و دوم ماه ژوئن سال 2010 میلادیعنوان: سعادت زناشویی؛ نویسنده: لئو (لیو) تولستوی؛مترجم: سروش حبیبی؛ تهران، چشمه، 1389؛ در 135 ص؛ چاپ دوم 1390؛ شابک: 9789643625832؛ موضوع: داستانهای نویسندگان روسی - قرن 19 مسعادت زنا‌شویی؛ داستان زندگی دخترکی جوان است که با خواهر و دایه اش در روستایی زندگی میکنند. ماشا درگیر عشقی دوسویه است. تولستوی حال و هوای عشق زندگی‌ بخش ماشا را با مهارت همیشگی، از زبان دخترک به تصویر می‌کشد. داستان از میانه ی خود، حال و هوایی شبیه «آناکارنینا»‌ پیدا می‌کند. ا. شربیانی...more

Impressive. This tale has almost one hundred pages and they only exist to pave way to the last few lines where a moral conclusion is reached. Feelings and ideas have their own life-cycle. They don't last forever and people need to learn to deal with it. Human beings constantly need to reinvent their perspectives since they can't help but learn, change and evolve. Let what has come to pass become history for you cannot get it back. It's an elegant concept. The book portrays this in a powerful fasImpressive. This tale has almost one hundred pages and they only exist to pave way to the last few lines where a moral conclusion is reached. Feelings and ideas have their own life-cycle. They don't last forever and people need to learn to deal with it. Human beings constantly need to reinvent their perspectives since they can't help but learn, change and evolve. Let what has come to pass become history for you cannot get it back. It's an elegant concept. The book portrays this in a powerful fashion. It is pretty traumatic to notice that your lover, that once utterly understood and completed you, can't relate to you anymore and vice-versa. Time has worked its magic.

On a completely different note, this book would be a feast for a scholar of Existentialism. Existentialism is all about that one defining experience that is so powerful that shapes your very existence. Not rarely, it's a love affair as such the one described in the book. However, all things must come to an end. What's a person to do when its defining experience suddenly is no more? Will he give in to a feeling of desperation or will he find resignation? ...more

Tolstoy, I believe, came to me at just the right point of my life - a year which has been, by far, the most turbulent one in my entire life. After reading War & Peace earlier this year, I was convinced that there is no better guidebook to 'better living' than Tolstoy's words. He, seemingly, has advise for everything under the sun.

Family Happiness begins at a lonely country house somewhere in Russia. We meet our protagonist, the seventeen year old Masha, just after her mother's death living aTolstoy, I believe, came to me at just the right point of my life - a year which has been, by far, the most turbulent one in my entire life. After reading War & Peace earlier this year, I was convinced that there is no better guidebook to 'better living' than Tolstoy's words. He, seemingly, has advise for everything under the sun.

Family Happiness begins at a lonely country house somewhere in Russia. We meet our protagonist, the seventeen year old Masha, just after her mother's death living a secluded life with her younger sister and governess. We follow Masha's story through 2 crucial periods of her life,both of which lead to an awakening of sorts or a sort of maturity. She is what you can imagine any teenager to be - longing for stimulation and city life, repressed by the isolation of the country. Yet this changes as she meets her late father's friend, the middle aged Sergey Mikhaylych, which is the first crucial period. Sergey's presence and company changes her teenage daydreams dramatically - her dreams change from one of want of stimulation to those of a desire for quiet domesticity and a life that's more giving. As they get married, the initial months are blissful ones. That changes as she slowly tires of the quiet country living that she she had so desired. That's when we see her enter the second crucial stage of her life - the one where her marriage begins to fail, and the love which had seemed so strong and ideal seems to fade.

From what I have read of Tolstoy, there seems to be some common themes running through his novels. One of those themes seem to be a search for happiness. What is happiness to Masha? At first, happiness for her is Sergey alone. Then, as she encounters the society at St. Petersburg and experiences the flattery, fame and the stimulation that it offers, that becomes happiness to her. Finally, when she leaves society behind, disillusioned and with a failed marriage, she finds herself miserable as she tries to regain back the former marital happiness to no avail.

Tolstoy suggests that there's no point in pining away for or attempting to resurrect what can't be brought back, but to instead find newer avenues of happiness. Things change and so do people. Once gone, these cannot revert back to the former state. So, there's no point in mourning for a past that won't come back.

At the same time, he seems to stress on how momentary joys are not real and are mere illusions.

It's interesting - this whole notion of evolving happiness, for it's human tendency to mourn for what will not come back, reminisce about what seems like the spotlessly beautiful past in hindsight. Either one can spend one's life being miserable about what is lost or one can make an effort to move forward into the future. The choice, in the end, is what decides happiness....more

After reading the book, I start thinking.. is reality that ugly and boring?Well, the world seems so wonderful, colorful, exciting.. and so on.. when you fall in love. You want to spend the rest of your life with someone you love, you consider marriage, you plan everything.. but, after a while, after the hormone stop working, after you become desensitized.. your life turns flat. even flatter than before. And maybe you'll think that it's sickening to have to live with the same person troughout youAfter reading the book, I start thinking.. is reality that ugly and boring?Well, the world seems so wonderful, colorful, exciting.. and so on.. when you fall in love. You want to spend the rest of your life with someone you love, you consider marriage, you plan everything.. but, after a while, after the hormone stop working, after you become desensitized.. your life turns flat. even flatter than before. And maybe you'll think that it's sickening to have to live with the same person troughout your life.So ugly.. isn't there any love that last forever?The book said, yes.. in other forms.. it's appreciation, commitment, respect.. ah, and maybe, conditioning. Hmm.. Not bad.Still, I can't stop dreaming about an everlasting love, in the most inspiring form. I hope.. ...more

"I felt that I was wholly his, and that I was happy in his power over me." So Masha thinks in the carriage after her wedding. She is, of course, in for a rude awakening. In Tolstoy's semi-autobiographical account of a teen marrying a 30-something and discovering that married life is not all roses and champagne. In fact, it's often petty and controlling, or so it seems. I like Tolstoy, usually, but this book brought me to the fact that Tolstoy raped his teenage wife numerous time in the carriage"I felt that I was wholly his, and that I was happy in his power over me." So Masha thinks in the carriage after her wedding. She is, of course, in for a rude awakening. In Tolstoy's semi-autobiographical account of a teen marrying a 30-something and discovering that married life is not all roses and champagne. In fact, it's often petty and controlling, or so it seems. I like Tolstoy, usually, but this book brought me to the fact that Tolstoy raped his teenage wife numerous time in the carriage ride to their rural estate. Reading some more on the history of Leo and his wife Sophia made me really quite sad and disheartened. I found it hard to give the book attention when I could see that it was so clearly Tolstoy putting words in his poor wife's voice. Her own voice, as seen in her diaries, is clear and painful regarding that carriage ride: "A Violence had been committed; this girl was not ready for marriage; female passion, recently awakened, was put back to sleep."

So sad.

But okay. As for the work itself. It's hasty. He's got all this girlish romance and then when we actually get to the marriage, it sort of peters out. All in all, unsatisfying. ...more

Opening lines:WE were in mourning for our mother, who had died the preceding autumn, and we had spent all the winter alone in the country—Macha, Sonia and I.Macha was an old family friend, who had been our governess and had brought us all up, and my memories of her, like my love for her, went as far back as my memories of myself.Sonia was my younger sister.

Quotations:There was no error in the remark which he so often made, that, in life, there was but one certain happiness: to live for others.

"AOpening lines:WE were in mourning for our mother, who had died the preceding autumn, and we had spent all the winter alone in the country—Macha, Sonia and I.Macha was an old family friend, who had been our governess and had brought us all up, and my memories of her, like my love for her, went as far back as my memories of myself.Sonia was my younger sister.

Quotations:There was no error in the remark which he so often made, that, in life, there was but one certain happiness: to live for others.

Of all novellas I've read, Family Happiness is the most enthralling by far. The crucial insights to the ideal form of love, family, and happiness are wisdoms that hang over the reader as a sweet mist for weeks afterward. Although short in words, the gentle and often sublime descriptive imagery offered by Tolstoy are beyond a website review. He displays such a handle over tone, voice and placement. However, as I said earlier, the most important layer to this novella is its message that love does Of all novellas I've read, Family Happiness is the most enthralling by far. The crucial insights to the ideal form of love, family, and happiness are wisdoms that hang over the reader as a sweet mist for weeks afterward. Although short in words, the gentle and often sublime descriptive imagery offered by Tolstoy are beyond a website review. He displays such a handle over tone, voice and placement. However, as I said earlier, the most important layer to this novella is its message that love does not truly have an 'ideal form', rather it has an ideal progression so to speak. It is not to be defined as unrelenting passion and lust, but as a very breakable bond that is too sacred to be broken by its clientele--and a pure love between a father and mother will lead to a happiness that exists beyond self-indulgence. It leads to family happiness; composed of love, sacrifice, and a hard-earned content--family happiness is the most sacred of all forms. Tolstoy is so wonderful! ...more

This book was only 90 pages, but it took me around 6 days to finish it, because I could not help the urge to keep rereading every single page to understand it and enjoy it fully.I'm glad that I've finally read something by Tolstoy. I've always wondered what all the fuss is about, and now it's pretty clear to me.His use of words is elegant but smooth, and that's exactly my type. I have to admit tho, it was quite depressing, Not overrated, but simply realistic. And I guess we all need a slap backThis book was only 90 pages, but it took me around 6 days to finish it, because I could not help the urge to keep rereading every single page to understand it and enjoy it fully.I'm glad that I've finally read something by Tolstoy. I've always wondered what all the fuss is about, and now it's pretty clear to me.His use of words is elegant but smooth, and that's exactly my type. I have to admit tho, it was quite depressing, Not overrated, but simply realistic. And I guess we all need a slap back to reality every now and then. So, it was my first Tolstoy, but it won't be the last. ...more

I liked this a lot more than I expected to... It's a little sad, because it's a story about falling out of love (well, falling IN love first, and then falling out) but there are definitely lessons to be learned.

Also, I found myself being amazed over and over how such a short book could manage to have such wonderful character and relationship development. There is more substantial and realistic relationship development in these 80 pages than in the entire Twilight series.

Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: Лев Николаевич Толстой; commonly Leo Tolstoy in Anglophone countries) was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist fiction. Many consider ToLev Nikolayevich Tolstoy (Russian: Лев Николаевич Толстой; commonly Leo Tolstoy in Anglophone countries) was a Russian writer who primarily wrote novels and short stories. Later in life, he also wrote plays and essays. His two most famous works, the novels War and Peace and Anna Karenina, are acknowledged as two of the greatest novels of all time and a pinnacle of realist fiction. Many consider Tolstoy to have been one of the world's greatest novelists. Tolstoy is equally known for his complicated and paradoxical persona and for his extreme moralistic and ascetic views, which he adopted after a moral crisis and spiritual awakening in the 1870s, after which he also became noted as a moral thinker and social reformer.

His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him in later life to become a fervent Christian anarchist and anarcho-pacifist. His ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal twentieth-century figures as Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr....more

“A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor — such is my idea of happiness.”
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“I can't praise a young lady who is alive only when people are admiring her, but as soon as she is left alone, collapses and finds nothing to her taste--one who is all for show and has no resources in herself”
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